Star Wars-garbed Surrey youngsters raise $10K for their school

Chances are somebody might say “May the 4th be with you” today, because it not only happens to be that day, but it’s a fun play on Star Wars’ “May the force be with you.”

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, a Star Wars-themed walkathon at St. Bernadette elementary school in Newton raised $10,000 Friday for the school’s athletics programs. The cash, said fundraiser co-chairwoman Michelle Fletcher, will help pay for, among other things, a new gym floor and jerseys for the St. Bee’s Stingers, who count track-and-field, volleyball and basketball among their specialties.

Do NOT mess with these guys

Many of the 212 pupils attending the school dressed up as various Star Wars characters.

“I am a big fan but so are the students,” Michael van der Pauw, the school’s principal, told the Now-Leader. “Hard not to go a day where kids aren’t asking me trivia or thoughts on the latest episode.”

The walk was five kilometres for the older pupils and about half that for the younger ones. “It was fantastic to see that we achieved our goal of $10,000,” he said. “It was really exciting to see that we got almost 100 per cent participation in this fundraising effort from our families.”

Five members of the 501st Legion, with 12,000 members all-told and 110 in B.C., who help with Star Wars-themed charity events, helped the school with its event.

“This is what we do — we dress up and do charity events,” Shannon Bradley, dressed up as an Imperial officer, said of herself and the other volunteers.